


Once Illuminated

by olga_eulalia



Category: Black Sails
Genre: Alternate Universe - Monastery, Crack, M/M, Oral Sex
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-08-20
Updated: 2017-08-20
Packaged: 2019-01-15 15:18:43
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,381
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12323622
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/olga_eulalia/pseuds/olga_eulalia
Summary: Unbeta'd. Non-native speaker writing here. Zero amount of research went into the making of this fic.





	Once Illuminated

**Author's Note:**

> Unbeta'd. Non-native speaker writing here. Zero amount of research went into the making of this fic.

For five whole days after his arrival at the monastery, Brother John had recounted the travails that had beset him on his journey to anyone who would listen and also to those few who would rather have not. How he had been plagued by thunderstorms and pelted by hailstones bigger than quail’s eggs. How he’d had to change his travel route when the river had become unnavigable only to find himself accosted by thieves, robbed of his meagre belongings which had also included the archbishop’s letter that they’d all been waiting for in their secluded sanctuary. 

But -- a much-travelled man for someone of his young age -- it was by far not the only tale he’d had to tell.

His chattiness had been excessive, so much so that Brother William had eventually suggested that Brother John take a vow of silence for the duration of seven days in order to reflect on what it meant to be guided through such dangers unscathed. It was one of the well-tried ways of maintaining good order and discipline in their community and it had never failed to work. Until now.

 

Apart from being the archbishop’s messenger, Brother John had been sent with the express purpose of looking through and assessing the state of their library, as his findings would be a major component in determining the extent of the funding that would be allocated for the monastery’s restoration.

Brother James, as it happened, was the custodian of said library, the keys to all its greatest treasures dangling from his corded belt, their jangling dulled by a leather pouch, as he walked down the hallway and across the cloistered courtyard before and after each prayer. As such, he found it most disconcerting when Brother John fell into whispering with the monks in the old scriptorium when they stretched their backs and rested their weary eyes. And, as such, he found it even more disconcerting when Brother John followed Brother William’s advice and showed up one morning refusing to partake of speech. Because now Brother James had to look him in the face to figure out what he wanted, had to study those blue eyes and that bright, comely visage for such an extensive amount of time each day that his dreams started to feature it as well, in a most unholy union of Scripture and Fantasy.

The predicament was amplified by the fact that Brother John seemed to have latched onto him from the day they’d met. Sharing the same place of work, soon Brother John had also chosen him as the main person to affiliate with during their communal meals, oblivious to the fact that such a thing as seating arrangements in the refectory existed.

In general, it could be observed that their guest readily adapted to some of their customs while remaining willfully ignorant of others.

Just the other day, for example, when Brother James had climbed out of the wooden tub after his bath, taking heed to not slip on the stone floor, he’d found Brother John standing between him and his discarded clothes, a mere six feet distant, having entered the room at some unknown point and looking at him in such a way that his body had unwittingly started readying itself for _something_. But, with answers as unattainable as Brother James’s clothes in that moment, they had just stared at each other until Brother John had begun to disrobe as well, disrupting the entire rigorous schedule of everyone’s bath times with a gesture as simple as that of untying his cincture’s knot.

All of this erratic behavior was being tolerated by the abbot of their monastery, Brother Harold, who was probably hoping for a more favourable outcome to their humble petition by showing leniency.

 

So, after a mere eleven days, Brother James could honestly say that he had seen a lot more of their guest than he knew how to handle with dignity, and that he could do with a little less of him at this point. The time for evening prayers was nearing and, as often, he was still in the library then, leafing through books whose pages needed to be turned from time to time in order to remain supple, reading a bit here and there. The last of the monks had cleared out of the adjacent room already, a circumstance that he was all too aware of when Brother John stopped his scritching and came over to him, carrying an open book which he went on to carefully place on the writing desk in front of them.

On display was a Latin text about how one ought to share the fruits of one’s labour and, together, rejoice in the splendour of them. One page showed a miniature of two men dancing around a slender tree, holding hands. Brother John turned the page. Now the tree was considerably bigger and one of the figures had climbed it while the other was lying back at its roots. There was one more illustration in which a red fruit had been plucked and was being shared by the two of them.

The corner of Brother James’s mouth twitched.

Brother John showed no such reservations. He smiled, displaying his pretty front teeth, the crinkles about his eyes like the rays of the sun coming up over the hillside after a frosty, moonless night.

Being around Brother John was such an odd experience for Brother James, who after a few days into their acquaintance suddenly found himself in the role of interpreter and the sole provider of their talk. He’d thought that, perhaps, he’d initially been singled out as a companion because Brother John liked a challenge when it came to the telling of his stories, but now he was realising with ever more profound clarity that he might have been wrong. All signs pointed to them sharing many of the same interests, but despite Brother John’s previous openness, Brother James couldn’t confirm it with absolute certainty. He had no idea what could be disclosed without second thoughts -- whether it was safe to admit that he thought the pictures were amusing too, whether he could say that these were some of the tamest ones on the subject in the collection -- seeing as he was talking to the archbishop’s representative here, who was known to be a man of little good humour. It was a mystery anyway how someone as good-natured as Brother John had come to work for someone as dour and calculating as that.

“You should--” Brother James waved a hand, indicating that they were finished here, that Brother John ought to gather his notes as he was so diligently wont to do and return the book to its former place. “We don’t want to be too late for Mass,” he said, though there was plenty of time yet.

Brother John did not seem to agree. He did not budge from his spot and the presence of his body did not allow Brother James to step out into the aisle, where he was sure it was easier to breathe, either. Feeling hemmed in, he lifted his head to throw a glare at Brother John.

But the pleading look on Brother John’s face took him by surprise. Need was written in every line there by a depth of vulnerability that devastated Brother James. He was ready to do anything, he realised, to make it disappear. But it also occurred to him that there was an obvious solution to Brother John’s problem.

“Do you need to confess?”

Brother John nodded eagerly.

“I’m sure the abbot will grant you abstention from your vow for the duration of the confession,” he said, distressing Brother John further, who shook his head vigorously enough to make the curls there leap about.

“I’m sorry. I don’t have the authority to do that,” Brother James said. “But whatever it is that ails you, you could always write it down and burn it after.” He turned halfway, reaching for paper, quill and ink in the corner of the writing desk, but Brother John pressed a hand down on his wrist, stilling him.

Brother James, swallowing thickly, directed his attention back towards Brother John, only to see him lean in close and tilt his head up.

With Brother John’s palm on his skin like this and able to feel his warm puffs of breath on his lips, he was painfully reminded of the coarseness of his monk’s habit when the skin all over his body started to pebble, the hair rising on the back of his neck an all too brief warning before the sensation descended over him in one fell swoop, and want scratched and tore at him with its claws. He slapped his free hand down over the edge of the desk to steady himself.

Starting with his hips, Brother John touched his body against Brother James, who had to fight the urge to part his thighs like an invocation, so that they were pressed together from chest to knees. And then, with his face upturned and his eyes open, slowly sank to his knees on the floor. Like a glistening-eyed angel serenely basking in the glory of Creation, every single one of his glossy curls a work of art unto itself, he looked up at Brother James, waiting.

“I don’t-- You should--” Brother James tried again.

Then he gave in and cautiously laid his hand on top of Brother John’s head.

In response, Brother John put his cheek against the aching center of Brother James and started to rub his face -- cheeks, brows, nose, open mouth, all of its loveliness -- all over it, while his hands were unceremoniously rucking the frock up Brother James’s legs and tucking it into the belt so that, as soon as it was done and Brother James was bare from the waist down, the view of Brother John, solemn in his worship -- palming naked thighs, grazing the tender skin between them with his thumbs -- was unobstructed.

Stroking up and down with his hands, stoking feverish excitement, Brother John now began to toy his wet mouth over the hard length of Brother James’s sex, tasting the head with the silky, pliant wrap of his lips, eyelashes fluttering as though he were deeply affected by the experience. He took Brother James deeper into the cavern of his mouth, letting him slide over the slippery rough of his tongue, inviting him down into the hot clench of his throat as he swallowed around him.

Brother James sobbed. He knew that if he were to make any other noise now, it would probably sound like the bull’s upset bellow out on the pasture, so he pressed his lips together tightly and kept his agonised groans confined.

Brother John then lavished him with motion and suction that had him straining and trembling, his skin so sweetly pulled at. Cushioned by the lushness of that mouth, worked at by a tongue that never let up, Brother James was losing himself in the sensations, until he could no longer discern which of the two of them was more eager for his pleasure or who was moving how and whether the floor was actually surging in waves. His release tore sharp and deep at him, tearing off a strip of his soul for spoils.

He sucked his lower lip between his teeth, breathing hard through his nose, but the shiver running through him would not abate for a long minute, nourished again and again as Brother John kept nuzzling about the juncture of his thighs, the sight of him doing so still hazy.

“Brother James?” a voice sounded from the outside.

Brother James craned his head over his shoulder.

Tall Brother William came to a halt at the open entrance door. He ducked his head inside, saying, “I’m looking for Brother John. It’s urgent.” So it was clear that not much was visible even from Brother William’s vantage point.

Brother James nodded. Then he shook his head, summoning his speaking voice. “He left a short while ago. He might be in his room.”

“Of course. Thank you, brother.”

After a moment, there came a series of tugs at his habit so that it fell to his ankles and covered him again. Then one more tug, asking him to sit on the floor and let both of them be obscured from view by the writing desk’s front panel.

Brother James readily complied. Once down there, he put an arm around Brother John’s shoulders and, in fits and starts, distracted by Brother John’s eyes, nosed his way in to press their mouths together fully. When he felt about under Brother John’s frock for his need, he found it satisfied already and, overcome with desire once more, was compelled to seek those firm, reddened lips out for another kiss, licking his tongue inside gently and closing his eyes.

 

Many of his fellow monks were milling about in front of the church’s side entrance. For a second, he believed they had somehow already found out about his violation of the Rule and were going to excommunicate him on the spot, but circumstantial evidence had told him many times in the past that his was among the transgressions that were quietly tolerated.

So, folding his hands in front of him and sidling up to Brother Joshua, he inquired about the commotion.

“You haven’t heard?”

Brother James couldn’t say that he had.

“The real Brother John was held up by bad weather and had to stay at an inn downriver where, they say, he fell gravely ill and died shortly after. So, naturally, our Brother John must be an imposter.”

“Huh?” Brother James asked for lack of anything more coherent to say. Thankfully, a wall was there to lean against.

“But none of the treasures in the church are gone. No money has disappeared. And even all the cutlery is accounted for which, as everybody knows, never happens.”

“When I locked the library, all the books were there, too.”

“See? Except for our Brother John now, nothing has gone missing,” Brother Joshua said. “I just don’t understand why anyone would impersonate one of us when they could actually join our community anytime they wanted.”

Looking about, it was clear that their fellow monks were less upset than they could have been, many of them having grown fond of their false brother in the short amount of time that he had stayed with them. They clearly admired him for his spirit and for what was seen as a great sacrifice by all when he made the choice to abstain from his favourite thing to do. So they were as of yet undecided whether they should feel upset about being duped at all and some could already be heard advocating the virtue of forgiveness.

Brother Harold appeared, dispersing the crowd a little when he strode directly towards Brother James. “I need to talk to you,” he said, leading Brother James away from the group. His intake of breath was deep and disconcerting. “We’ve had word from the archbishop and, I’m afraid, he’s not granting us any funds either. Moreover, he was sending Brother John -- the real one -- to determine whether our library was suitable to house such costly treasures, and in the event that the answer should be no -- which it most likely will be -- initiate the transfer of it in its entirety to the archbishop’s summer residence.”

Upon seeing the reaction on Brother James’s face, he put a comforting hand on his shoulder and added, “I’m sorry.”

 

Almost ten years had passed since Brother James had been received into this community and had started his new life as a monk. The first couple of months had been difficult, his spirit biting and toiling at the reins, but eventually he had settled in, finding solace in the daily routine and a new purpose in the loving upkeep of the library.

The moment Brother Harold had given him the news, however, his former self had risen within him like a revenant, dragging all its ugly history, its fields of corpses behind as though they were the blood-soaked rags of a butcher.

Standing at the edge of the courtyard, he was now looking at the last of the sun’s golden rays glancing over the many dilapidated gables while the grey chill of evening had already enveloped the rest. His breaths were shallow. He was looking, but he was not really understanding. 

And, as always in these moments, there was this thing within him that promised a way that would make him hurt less. That told him that if he were to seek out and rage against those who did injustice, it would be good, because it would be righteous. But he knew that thing well by now and had come to see it for what it was.

Eventually, he was sure, he would bear these losses as well, he just did not know how he would do it yet.

He turned his face towards the library, his doomed refuge, then, his intentions unclear. But as he was unlocking the entrance door, he noticed that instead of there being twelve keys, only eleven were dangling on the key ring. And as he was studying them closer, trying to discern which one was missing, his imagination helpfully supplied that the boarded windows in the attic could easily be reached by climbing the trellis on the side of the building if one were not averse to hazardous tasks. If one, say, was of a mind to steal an item from within.

 

Having slipped inside the building quietly, Brother James stopped and listened. Not a sound was to be heard.

Only once his eyes had adjusted to the darkness, did he become aware of the faint glow of light that fanned out from underneath the closed door at the back where they kept large iron-bound oak chests full of manuscripts too gem-studded, too fragmentary, too nonconforming to be made openly available. It was the key to one of those that had disappeared.

If Brother John had kept his nerve and utilised his cleverness to the last he would have barred the room from the inside, but the closeness of achieving his goal must have made him careless, because, when pushed, the door swung open without any resistance. The candle flame flickered and almost went out. There he was, their Brother John, on the floor, slapping the tome he’d been reading shut and scrambling to his feet.

“You could have asked,” Brother James said.

There must have been something in his expression that made Brother John frown and clutch the book tighter.

“You don’t have to pretend to stick to your vow, _brother_.”

Brother John tried to make a dash for the door, but was stopped all too easily. With an out-flung arm Brother James prevented his escape and pushed him against the wall, one hand at his throat.

“Did you kill the real Brother John?”

“What?” the man said. “No!” he protested. “I was just another traveller at the inn. We were talking until midnight when he excused himself because he wasn’t feeling well. Next day he didn’t show, so I carried his breakfast up to his room, but by then his fever had already gotten bad. When he wasn’t coughing his lungs out, he was actually trying to climb the walls. And then it wasn’t long before, you know--”

“So why come here, then? What are you looking for in here?”

Brother John tried to lift the book he was holding, its title written in gilded Arabic script. “Initially, I came for this. On the Potentiality of Transmutation.”

“Also known as The Frenzied Ramblings of Vasquez the Andalusian. Yes, I am aware of it. Though it won’t be of much use to you since it’s missing one vital page. The second half of the formula that supposedly turns base metals into gold.”

Brother John smiled, self-satisfied. “ _That_ ,” he said, “I have memorized.”

Brother James took him by his habit’s collar. “Who the fuck are you?” he asked, an unbidden bout of fondness weakening his anger to desperation.

“Well, coincidentally, my name is actually John,” the man explained, “John Silver. And I happen to know about your plight. I also happen to be a very good alchemist.”


End file.
